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Nursing History Small Collections

Small Collections

This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held
at the University of Pennsylvania. Unless
otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in our
reading room, and not digitally available through the web.

Scope and Contents

Most of the collections included here consist of personal papers, student lecture notes from various nursing schools, and
assorted nursing memorabilia and ephemera. Of particular significance are the two letters written by Florence Nightingale
(MC 44).

Historical Sketch

Freedmen's Hospital was established in 1865 as the Freedmen's Bureau for the "relief of freed men and refugees" by the War
Department of the United States. This was due in part to the many freed slaves who migrated to Washington, D.C. following
the Civil War. Four years after the hospital's founding, they relocated to the campus of Howard University. The School of
Nursing was founded in 1894 as an eighteen-month program which was later expanded two years. In 1909, the length of study
was increased to three years. In the early twentieth century, the school affiliated with a number of institutions in the Washington
area in addition to Howard, such as the Gallanger Municipal Hospital and the D.C. General Hospital. The hospital phased out
the school and graduated its last class in 1973. Howard University opened their baccalaureate school of nursing the following
year to replace Freedmen's. Over Freedmen's 79-year period, it graduated 1,700 nurses.

The Freedmen's Hospital Nurses Alumni Clubs, based in Washington, D.C., coordinates local clubs around the country. The Freedmen's
Hospital Nurses Alumni Club of Philadelphia, founded in 1966, was established to promote goodwill among its graduates, to
participate in the community health and cultural and educational programs, and to support the scholarship fund of the Freedmen's
(and later) the Howard University Federation.

Scope and Contents note

This collection includes five folders of miscellaneous materials that document some of the activities of the Philadelphia
club. There is also one publication of oral interviews produced by the national office.

Controlled Access Headings

Corporate Name(s)

Freedmen's Hospital Nurses Alumni Club of Philadelphia.

Form/Genre(s)

Administrative records

Subject(s)

African American nurses

Box

1

Philadelphia Club History, 1973.

Scope and Contents note

Copies of historical excerpts, club's purpose, list of charter members, and other activities.

History of school uniform, 1894-1973.

Photographs of presentation of Freedmen's Hospital nurses' painting to Center for the Study of the History of Nursing, 1986.

Biographical/Historical note

Florence Nightingale was born into a British well-connected, upper-class family in May 1820. She entered nursing in 1844 following
a “call from God,” rebelling against expectations for a woman of the period. In October 1854 she set out with 38 volunteer
nurses to aid the sick and wounded during the Crimean War. She is known for working for better conditions for military hospitals
and general conditions for the nursing profession. She died at age 90 in August 1910.

Scope and Contents note

This collection contains two letters and one envelope unrelated to the letters. All three items contain hand and type-written
notations concerning gift status and dates for which there is no documentation authentication.

Controlled Access Headings

Form/Genre(s)

Letters (correspondence)

Occupation(s)

Nurse

Personal Name(s)

Nightingale, Florence, 1856-1896

Subject(s)

Crimean War, 1853-1856--Medical care.

Nursing--History.

Box

1

Envelope.

Description

The envelope is addressed by hand to the Rev. T.S. Greene at Claydon Rectory. "To enquire particularly after the Rev. Greene
with Florence Nightingale’s anxious and kindest regards 1/5/82." No authentication of handwriting.

Letter from Scutari Barrack Hospital, March 3, 1856.

Description

Personal letter wishing a woman well with her pregnancy and requesting the child, if a boy, be named after her father.

Letter to Major General Thomas Mannsell, October 31, 1896.

Description

This letter concerns conditions surrounding the purchase of Embley, the family home in England.

Controlled Access Headings

Personal Name(s)

Biographical/Historical note

Mary Margaret Robinson Godfrey (January 25, 1886- May 28, 1995) was a naval nurse during World War I and was the first Navy
nurse to serve aboard ship. She graduated from the Thomas Jefferson Hospital School of Nursing in 1909, and joined the Navy
Nurse Corps in 1910. Prior to World War I, Godfrey was stationed in the Philippines and Mare Island. She was also Chief Nurse
at the Old Grey's Ferry Naval Home and Hospital. Later she was director of nursing at League Island Navy Hospital. While at
League Island that she contracted -- and survived -- the Spanish flu. During the war she was called to be Chief Nurse on board
the troop ship the Leviathan. She left the Navy in 1919.

Her obituaries can be found at the following links: http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=Z1sPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=-oQDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6486%2C115052
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=85217739&PIpi=92384902

Scope and Contents note

This small collection includes Godfrey's letter of appointment; a reprint of an article titled "Iodized Catgut: Drying, Sterilizing,
and Storing"; and a reprint of a presentation at nurses convention in Cleveland, OH, 1918.

Scope and Contents note

The lecture notes are from the period of Alice Lemley's study at the Philadelphia Hospital Training School for Nurses, 1887-1888.
Topics touched upon in the notes include obstetrics, nervous frustration, contagious diseases, and antiseptic use.

Examination: University of the State of New York; surgical nursing; diet cooking, obstetric and gynecologic nursing; materia
medica; hygiene and sanitation; pediatric nursing including communicable diseases and orthopedics.

Scope and Contents note

Controlled Access Headings

Corporate Name(s)

Nurses for the Future Conference.

Form/Genre(s)

Proceedings

Box

2

Original transcript, June 29-30, 1987.

Scope and Contents note

This transcript contains the first day's sessions: “An Analysis of the Effects of Current Initiatives to Attract Quality Undergraduate
Nursing Students: Strategies for a Brighter Future,” “Riding the Yoyo: The Work and Worth of Nursing in the 20th Century,”
“The Talent Pool in Nursing: A Comparative and Longitudinal Perspective,” “Factors Associated with Cyclical Nursing Shortages
A Labor Economist's Analysis of Nursing.”

Original transcript, June 30, 1987.

Scope and Contents note

This transcript contains the second day's sessions: Nursing For College Graduates Panel Discussion: What Happens If..., Strategies
for Change

Folder containing conference papers.

Scope and Contents note

This folder contains the following papers: Welcome letter by Claire Fagin, "A Labor Economist's Analysis of Nursing" by Charles
R. Link, nursing program statistics, "Recurring Hospital Nurse Shortages: Explanations and Solutions" by Linda H. Aiken and
Connie Flynt Mullinix, "The Talent Pool in Nursing, A Comparative and Longitudinal Perspective" by Kenneth C. Green. Nurses
for the Future conference: "Strategies for Change," "Nursing for College Graduates" by Donna Diers, "Riding the Yo-yo: The
Work and Worth of Nursing in the 20th Century."

Scope and Contents note

This collection contains mostly hand-written lecture notes (a few typed pages), both loose and in notebooks, on all aspect
of nurses training (e.g., ethics, gymnastics, dietetics, gynecology, lab techniques, operations and operating room techniques,
venereal disease, etc). The notes were taken by Overholt as a student from 1921 – 1923 at the Allentown Hospital School of
Nursing. There also are senior exam questions in different subjects, and a page of the State Board exam questions for “Medical
Nursing and Specialties”, June 8th, 1922.

Scope and Contents note

This small collection includes printed materials collected by Currier, along with one photograph of an American Association
of Nurse Anesthetists (AANA) meeting from 1938. It also includes an oral history transcript of an interview with Russel Lynn
about Currier's life and career, conducted when Currier was 102 years old.

Biographical/Historical note

Hazel Peterson Currier was born November 7, 1903. She attended nursing school at the University of Minnesota, graduating in
1925. She became a nurse anesthetic and was actively involved in professional organizations such as the American Association
of Nurse Anesthetists (AANA) and the Pennsylvania Nurse Anesthetists. She retired in 1970.

Pennsylvania Tidings 15, No. 2 [News and Views of Pennsylvania Nurse Anesthetists], with photograph of Ms. Currier during
her term as Vice President of the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists and candidate for President-elect of the American
Association of Nurse Anesthetists, August 1965.

Photograph of Helen Featherson, President Elect of AANA [clip from unidentified publication].

Biographical/Historical note

Tabitha Parker Fondes was born in Parsonsburg, Maryland. She helped her widowed mother raise four siblings until the age of
23 when she learned about a career in nursing. This information was carried in a newspaper ad – a call for student nurses
at the Mercer Hospital in Trenton, New Jersey – that was blowing across a field she was hoeing. Thus began her 50-year career
in nursing. Initially, she was involved in private duty nursing.

She met her husband, James Peter Fondes, while in Philadelphia for a nursing convention after World War I. They raised three
children during the Depression. After World War II, her son Alex brought home an Army buddy, William Marchant, who became
integrated into the family. A writer for the theater, he is responsible for many successful plays and screen plays. In 1975,
he dedicated his biography of Noel Coward, “The Privilege of his Company” to Tabitha Parker Fondes.

She spent time with her son Alex, a theatrical researcher, and became a motherly figure to prominent American actors such
as Anthony Franciosa, Ben Gazzara, Shelly Winters, Elaine Stritch, and Maureen Stapleton. While living in England her son
became friends with Sir Michael Redgrave and his family as well as members of the Queens household. When Tabitha Fondes visited,
she had a meeting with the Queen Mother.

Another son, Robert Parker Fondes, is an avid historian and preservationist. He established the Robert Parker Fondes Endowment
in Nursing in her memory at Salisbury State University in Maryland. Her son states it was created in “celebration of a life
that took a farm girl from Parsonsburg to demanding motherhood in Philadelphia, to some of the most sophisticated and lively
circles in the world.” (Information from the “Alumni News” Vol. 11 No.1 Spring 1996, page 3.)

Scope and Contents note

This collection contains records of significant achievements in Fondes' career, notably her New Jersey and Pennsylvania nursing
licenses and registration.

Scope and Contents note

Dorothy L. Feifer Renz annotated this Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania Procedure Manual during her time at the Hospital
of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP) School for Nursing between 1953-1954. It documents Renz's understanding of HUP's nursing
curriculum and clinical practice procedures during the midcentury period.

Controlled Access Headings

Corporate Name(s)

Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing.

Form/Genre(s)

Manuals (instructional materials)

Personal Name(s)

Renz, Dorothy L. Feifer

Box

5

Hospital of University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing Procedure Manual, Annotated, circa 1954.

Biographical/Historical note

Marjorie Elizabeth Snider McNeil was born in 1922. She graduated from the University of Michigan School of Nursing in 1943,
and joined the Army Nurse Corps the following year. After five weeks of basic training, she was posted to Jefferson Barracks
in St. Louis, Missouri. Her war service took her overseas to the 103rd General Hospital Unit in England. After the war she
married and moved to Cambridge, Massachussetes, where she worked as an obstetrical nurse. In 1948 the McNeils relocated again,
this time to Ann Arbor. She did not resume her nursing work except for a brief period around the time of her father's death
in 1964. In the 1970s she entered the kitchenware business and became president of a local store until her retirement in 1989.
McNeil died in Vienna, Virginia, in 2005.

Scope and Contents note

This collection consists of approximately 200 pages of obstetrics class lecture notes taken by Marjorie E. McNeil, University
of Michigan School of Nursing, July - September 1942. The notes are accompanied by a few pages of biographical material prepared
by Laurie McNeil.